The present invention relates to devices for dispensing toilet bowl treating chemicals (e.g. cleaners, disinfectants, deodorizers, etc.). More specifically, it relates to devices that allow a consumer to direct a toilet treatment tablet into the toilet bowl when a button is actuated.
Toilet bowls require care to prevent the buildup of unsightly deposits, to reduce odors and to prevent bacteria growth. Traditionally, toilet bowls have been cleaned, deodorized and/or disinfected by manual scrubbing with a liquid or powdered cleaning/sanitizing agent that is added to the bowl water by hand. This task has required manual labor to keep the toilet bowl clean.
To reduce or in some cases eliminate the need for such manual scrubbing, various automatic toilet bowl cleaning systems have been proposed. One type of system delivers the cleaning chemical by adding it to the flush water while the flush water is still stored in the toilet tank. Some embodiments of this type of system add the chemical to the flushing cycle in liquid form. Others place a block of cleaning chemical in the toilet tank, to slowly dissolve over several weeks or longer.
However, in systems which rely on adding the chemical to the toilet tank, precise control over the quantity of chemical to be delivered may be difficult. For example, different water hardness from the supply may cause different cleaning blocks to dilute at different rates. Further, the objective is to keep the toilet bowl clean, not the water holding tank. Since all the cleaner is dispensed into the toilet tank, rather than the toilet bowl, much of the cleaner may be flushed down the drain without cleaning the toilet bowl at all.
An alternative type of system hangs a dispenser adjacent and/or immediately under the toilet bowl rim. Water flowing from the rim washes over the dispenser, thereby triggering dispensing of the stored chemical directly into the bowl water. However, some consumers may prefer not to have the ornamental exterior of their toilet disrupted by the presence of a hook hanger.
In any event, such systems are designed to dispense in response to each flush. In some situations where increased amounts of flushing are occurring (e.g., a large number of guests) cleaning chemicals may not be necessary after every flushing. Thus, some of these systems may use up more cleaning chemicals than is actually needed.
There have been attempts to associate toilet bowl chemical dispensers with the lids or other coverings of toilets, or near them. See, for example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 713,978, 749,963, 979,386, 988,178, 3,840,914, 4,216,553, 4,819,276 and 6,745,417, and U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2006/0097189. However, these systems suffer from various of the deficiencies noted above. For example, it is typical with many of such systems to have dispensing occur with every toilet lid movement, regardless of need.
It can therefore be seen that improvements are desired with respect to toilet bowl cleaning devices that dispense toilet bowl treatment chemicals.